How to Grow Peanut Sprouts: The Latest Cultivation Technique Tutorial
Peanut sprouts are a food that serves both as food and as a therapeutic remedy. They can even be eaten raw, and they are particularly rich in nutrients: their energy, protein and crude fat content ranks first among all kinds of vegetables, and they are rich in vitamins, minerals such as potassium, calcium, iron and zinc, and the various amino acids and trace elements the human body needs. They are known as the “longevity fruit sprout”, also called longevity sprouts. Now let us take a look at peanut sprout cultivation techniques!
The Cultivation Prospects of Peanut Sprouts
Peanut sprouts are a newly developed type of pollution-free, high-grade sprout vegetable. Using the new foam box soilless cultivation technique to produce peanut sprouts, they can be produced in all four seasons. No chemical fertilizers or pesticides need to be applied during production, there is no pollution, and they are a very healthy vegetable with excellent cultivation prospects.
Preparation for Growing Peanut Sprouts
1. Variety selection: Choose small-seeded peanut varieties. Use new seeds from the current year that are plump, uniform in size, undamaged, with strong sprouting vigor and a high germination rate.
2. Production site: Peanut sprout production has relatively strict requirements for temperature and humidity conditions. Generally no light is needed, but fresh, smooth-flowing air is required. An idle living room or an old vacant room can be used. For winter cultivation, use a greenhouse, plastic tunnel or another place that can be heated.
3. Foam box specifications: Foam boxes of various specifications can be used. Generally choose a box 60 cm long, 40 cm wide and 25 cm high, with a level bottom and drainage and ventilation holes.
Peanut Sprout Cultivation Techniques
1. Sowing method: First wash the seeds and remove the shriveled seeds, seed coats and impurities floating on the water surface. Then soak them in 20°C warm water for 12-17 hours, washing and changing the clear water once in between. Place a layer of newspaper on the bottom of the foam box, spread 2 cm of clean river sand on it, evenly scatter the soaked seeds on the sand surface in the box, then cover the foam box with a layer of black plastic film to keep warm, retain moisture and block light. Keep the temperature inside the box at 23-28°C, and spray water 2-3 times a day.
2. Cultivation management: 2-3 days after sowing, when the sprouts are 1 cm long, remove all the seed kernels that have not sprouted. The optimum temperature for peanut sprout growth is 18-25°C. In summer, spray more water to cool down; in winter, strengthen insulation. During the growth period, water 3-4 times a day, preferably with clean well water, each time watering enough to wet all the sprouts and soak the substrate through. During cultivation, the room should be kept dim with no light, otherwise the peanut sprouts will turn green, affecting appearance and taste.
3. Timely harvest: Under normal cultivation conditions, from sowing to harvest takes 7-8 days in summer and autumn, and 8-10 days in winter and spring. When the sprouts are 12-15 cm long, the top lobes have opened with no visible cotyledons, there is no rotting stem, no off odor and no fibrous roots, they can be harvested.